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Most villains (and the occasional hero, but this is largely a villain power), if given the chance, will employ magic or mechanisms to confuse his or her enemies and render them vulnerable, but a Master of Illusion will go beyond merely using such trickery as a tool. Instead, he or she will hone it into a fine art form; milking it for as much trickery, espionage, and/or personal pleasure as they can derive from it.

Such powers are usually psychic in origin, although they can also be technological as well, creating Holograms which can be especially dangerous when they can make them solid (holograms also carry the bonus of being able to fool electronic surveillance). Despite lacking obvious means of attack like with Pyrokinesis and Telekinesis, they can use a Faux Flame to burn, though resolute heroes may resist, or making a gaping hole seem like an even floor. A common variant is for the Master of Illusion to trap the hero in a virtual reality simulation over which the villain has complete control. Of course, death or injury in the simulation will usually mean death or injury in real life, so any hero thus ensnared will have to be careful. Most Masters of Illusion aren't content to just let their VR deathtrap program play out by itself - what would be the fun in that after all? So they'll frequently appear in the simulation, usually as a cackling, monstrous tormentor who plays cat and mouse games with the hero and who mocks their every step. If the Master of Illusion traps a hero in a Lotus-Eater Machine,—or in a simulation of their ordinary, everyday life—they'll frequently appear as an ally of the hero, using this form to distract the hero from discovering their true whereabouts, or as part of a ruse to trick the hero into revealing some important confidential information.

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In more insidious cases, the Master of Illusion will appear to the hero as a romantic interest, either one the hero knows, or one that's been created whole cloth out of the hero's own memories and desires. This gives the Master of Illusion the chance to screw with the hero's mind (and body, depending on how far the writers let things go.)

Masters of Illusion really needn't bother with such elaborate setups. It would be easy enough, after all, to trick an enemy into killing himself: use some variant of the "This Is Not a Floor" trick; destroy a spaceship by having its crewmembers press the wrong buttons and steer it into the nearest star; kill the heroes by having them confuse each other for enemies and fatally attack each other.. But again, what would be the fun in doing something as simple as that? Masters of Illusion, having Trickster personalities by the very nature of their powers, will usually not be able to resist playing with their prey. Of course, this could—and usually does - give the heroes the time and/or chance to think up a way to counter the Master of Illusion's powers, or leave clues that they are in an illusion in the first place, such as a Blank Book. Once the villain is destroyed, the world they create usually dissolves into nothingness - provided the defeat or death of the Master of Illusion wasn't part of the illusion itself...

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And really, as a hero... how would you know? Could you ever really be sure that you defeated the Master of Illusion and escaped? Why is Schrödinger's Butterfly flapping nearby?

Interestingly, the Master of Illusion will very rarely turn out to be the Big Bad - this is because they're far less interested in ruling people than they are in just screwing with them. For some reason, the Big Bad who employs a Master of Illusion never worries that he himself might be enthralled or under their control. (Although if he were, would the Master of Illusion allow him to experience any doubts?) Also, while the Master of Illusion is usually villainous, heroic examples are hardly unknown. If the Master of Illusion is the Big Bad, their power over illusions may become borderline Reality Warping.

Note: This trope doesn't apply to villains who occasionally employ illusory tricks to ensnare enemies. The Master of Illusion is a specialist in generating manipulative hallucinations, and will usually possess no other powers apart from that. (Although when you have the ability to trick the Mighty Glacier into thinking that his 6-foot long claymore is a flyswatter and that a poisonous mosquito has just landed on the back of his buddy's neck, who needs other powers?)

Examples:

Bleach. Sosuke Aizen's illusions are so powerful than anyone who sees him release his Zanpakutō even once falls prey to them ever after. There's no sure-fire way to tell if the illusions are fake or real unless you can gain excellent knowledge of the subject the illusion is covering. His Zanpakutō fits his personality perfectly, as Aizen is the creepy, mysterious, manipulative Big Bad. He also consistently shows us that illusions are not a 'soft' power. There is only one known immunity to falling under the spell: being blind. The only way to escape the power once ensnared is to touch the blade before the illusions can be activated (good luck trying to work out if the illusions are already active, however). It takes decades for Gin to learn this tidbit and even then he has to wait decades more for a moment when he's absolutely certain Aizen isn't using his power before he touches the blade. Yamamoto did work out for himself that there was a relationship between the blade and the power, as he realised having the sword buried in his gut enabled him to work out the exact location of Aizen's reiatsu.

In the final arc, it's shown that not even the virtually omnipotent Yhwach is immune to Aizen's illusions. In fact, given that Yhwach's "The Almighty" power is triggered by sight, it's possible that he's even more vulnerable than other characters would be. While Yhwach can see all possible futures and alter them, it would seem that Aizen's illusions cause him to see and attempt to alter illusory futures instead of real ones.

Junichiro Tanizaki from Bungou Stray Dogs is this trope. His power is instrumental for freeing himself and Atsushi from the clutches of a very lethal doll stored in an alternate dimension.

Takumi Nishijō from Chaos;Head could be considered a master of illusion; of course his illusions mostly affect himself. But given that half the time he doesn't know if it's reality or not, I'd say it applies.

Heroic example: Mystogan/Mist Gun is a mysterious man who usually tries to avoid contact with anyone else in the title guild. His illusions are so convincing and so well used that he's an S-Class mage, and ranks with Gildarts and Laxus as one of the guild's top three. You later find out his reason for staying mysterious: He's an alternate universe counterpart of a man who is a hated criminal in this world. He's here to stop his nation's king from carrying out a deadly plan, and he doesn't want to be mistaken for the criminal while he does his work.

Later on, Jellal ups the ante by impersonating Mystogan — including his magic. The fact that he's using illusion magic is itself an illusion!

Midnight can do this by bending light before it reaches his target's eyes.

Get Backersloves this trope, as it allows them to Reset Button all the heart-wrenching deaths in an arc when it turns out that most of it didn't actually happen. The IL arc was an example of a technological version (with supernatural help), and Divine Design was a purely magical one.

Neko of K has this as her major power as a Strain. To be precise, she is capable of manipulating people's senses to a massive extent; she doesn't actually turn into a cat for example and yet somehow her illusion powers lets her pull this off. Said manipulation of senses extents to manipulating memories.

Kogarashi, the titular Kamen no Maid Guy, has among his (effectively infinite) powers one called "Daydreaming Maid Guy Illusion." His uses for it are rather... creative. Such as scaring his master Naeka out of a forced fasting, sending one of her kendo rivals into a rampage, and other fun and games. He is a Sociopathic Hero.

In Naruto many characters can create illusions (a sensible ability for the magic-using ninja). Notably, while some are the standard 'hologram'-style type of illusion, others (such as what the Uchihas and Tayuya typically use) involve 'hacking' the target's central nervous system and making them see, hear, and feel what the caster wants them to.

The undisputed master is Aloof Big Brother Itachi Uchiha, who forced his little brother Sasuke to relive the deaths of their family at his hands over and over, on two separate occasions. Most people affected by his illusions become mentally scarred. It's even mentioned long after his death that Sasuke's illusion techniques still can't compare to Itachi's. An important thing to note is that Itachi doesn't solely rely on his Sharingan to cast illusions, making the whole "don't look in his eyes" plan a lot less useful.

This ultimately leads to a bizarre battle when two of these, Sasuke and Itachi, both used an illusion to make the other think they won—which is followed up with more illusions within the first illusions. And more within THOSE! If there was ever a fight scene that could be accurately described using the phrase Mind Screw, this would be it. They don't even move until a few chapters after the battle starts! It's all illusions! This is probably why genjutsu isn't used that much by protagonists; if it's used by more than one side, it gets real confusing and old, real fast.

This, in turn, is revealed to be a downgraded version of the Sage of the Six Paths' power. He had the ability to make illusions become real and used this power to create nine Kaijuu.

The 2nd Mizukage has also been revealed to be a Master of Illusion in his fight against the Allied Shinobi Forces. After his clam creates mirages (which are specifically not the same thing as genjutsu, meaning that the normal ways for a character to escape from a genjutsu don't work) he tries to offer advice on how to defeat them, with hilarious results.

One Piece: Brook is revealed to be one of these post-Time Skip, after he's tapped into the full power of his Devil Fruit abilities; he uses this trope in conjunction with his music just long enough for him to pull off his You Are Already Dead swordplay.

In the episode "Malice in Wonderland" Mismagius shows off Master of Illusion powers by hypnotizing all the main characters (except, inexplicably, Brock's Croagunk).

Zoroark, a Pokémon from the fifth generation, has the ability to take on the appearance of the Pokémon she faces in a battle. The illusion breaks when she takes sufficient damage. To top that off, Zoroark is the main Pokémon in the 13th movie, appropriately titled Zoroark: Master of Illusions. Zoroark's ability is showcased in a trailer for the 13th movie, where she assumes the appearances of the Legendary Beasts from Generation 2 (who are also featured Pokémon in the film) and Ash.

Zoroark's previous stage, Zorua, also possesses the same ability and stars in the 13th Pokémon movie alongside Zoroark.

The Gastly line has been show repeatedly to use illusions to either drive people away or just mess with them.

In Rave Master, the villain Lance wields the Beast Sword, which can generate illusions of creatures like wolves and dragons. Normally, he uses these to distract his opponent. He acquires the Dark Bring, Real Moment, which lets him make his illusions solid for a moment at a time.

Akio Ohtori in Revolutionary Girl Utena has elements of this, but in his world believing illusions is effectively making them real; he even makes presumably dead or terminally ill people hallucinate that they are alive and well, and they indeed are, as long as the illusion holds.

Dais from Ronin Warriors uses illusions to trick the heroes into attacking each other. He also uses psychological warfare to trick one of the heroes into believing that his own Empathic Armor will eventually corrupt him.

Phoenix Ikki. Once used his "Phoenix Illusion Demonic Fist", it sends various nightmare illusions directly created by the opponent's brain; he or she is trapped within an illusion that is almost indistinguishable from reality.

Gemini Saga. This is how he can duplicate his Temple, control his cloth far away from the battlefield and create an infinite maze in his temple which can trap his opponents for an eternity... unless someone breaks his concentration.

Virgo Shaka. When he strikes, the enemy sees his glittering form against a breathtaking view of fantastic worlds and places within the Buddhist tradition; such illusions are a part of his technique in confusing and defeating opponents using something akin to psychological warfare.

In The Twelve Kingdoms, the Trickster Demon in Youko's sword shows her illusions in an attempt to get her to kill herself and do morally reprehensible things. (It also gave her good advice from time to time, so she never quite knew when to listen to it and when not to.) Eventually, Youko learned that the sword reflected her own thoughts and fears back onto her, and she decided, instead of fearing the sword's power, to use it as a tool for understanding herself.

The main characters of Wolf's Rain are real wolves that give off the illusion of humans. Much to the disappointment of (some) fangirls.

Plasma the Light Demon from Yaiba can create perfect illusions by manipulating the light in the surroundings.

Yami Yugi in the earlier parts of the manga and season 0 of Yu-Gi-Oh!, had this as his trademark: he would challenge, cajole, or trick villains into playing a game with him, and when they lost, would inflict a "penalty game" punishment in the form of a vivid, symbolically-appropriate hallucination, often one that reveals the villain's root sin and/or turns it against them, for example, causing a greedy extortionist bully to go insane and roll around in a pile of leaves and garbage laughing with glee, convinced that he's rolling in a pile of 10,000 yen notes. Or causing an exploitative documentary filmmaker who distorts the truth to get high ratings to see the entire world censored with heavy pixelation.

Titan in Yu-Gi-Oh! GX initially employs this to make people think he holds a Millennium Item. The trick is foiled when the protagonists realize that different people see different things (Hayato sees one arm vanished from Judai and Sho sees the other arm, for example), and the trick is broken.

In Zatch Bell!, Kanchomé, previously thought to be little more than The Load, is revealed to be one of these in the final saga. His illusions work by sending signals directly to the hearts and minds of those involved, making even the knowledge that they're not real useless in breaking the spell.

The Flash villain Abra Kadabra. Born in the 64th century, he initially used technology from his time that seemed like magic to the people of the present; however, he has recently gained the power to perform actual sorcery by striking a Deal with the Devil.

Princess Projectra from Legion of Super-Heroes is a heroic version of this; her illusions can fool anyone even when they know that she's using her powers on them.

Brainwave started off as a master of illusion, then inherited his dad's telepathy. Then he got stuck in the HeelFace Revolving Door, not so much because he was that awesome, but because nobody could remember which side he was on last (or, in one case, that his dad, who had similar powers and used his son's appearance because he was a freaky midget dude, was dead).

Phobia, an old Teen Titans villain, has powers like the "fear" version of Danielle Moonstar's. Starting with Identity Crisis, Phobia has been turned into an incredibly squicky version of this trope, with her abducting heroes and villains to become her playthings.

Wonder Woman villain the Duke of Deception uses his illusions to spread falsehoods among humanity to provoke them into conflict and war. He often vainly projects an attractive illusion of himself.

The rather different version of the Duke of Deception in The Legend of Wonder Woman still possesses this power, but uses it to make his victims feel despair and see death and horror surrounding them.

Marvel

Doctor Strange at times (usually when he wants to get rid of enemies without using force). His enemies Nightmare, Mephisto, and D'Spayre are more aggressive about it and all have attempted to catch him in a Psychological Torment Zone.

Loki, as one would expect from the God of Mischief. This is better showcased following his HeelFace Turn in recent years, in particular in Loki: Agent of Asgard. He's so good at this that he's able to escape an inescapable prison cell during an interrogation, put his interrogator in said cell, and escape before anyone's none the wiser. Technically young comicbook Loki is an incredibly powerful Reality Warper but thanks to the side-effects of his magic (runs on story logic, prone butterfly effects etc.) tends to prefer less invasive methods of manipulation like illusions or technomancy.

Mysterio falls into this trope, though his illusions are all based from his previous employment in the special effects industry. He even titles himself "The Master of Illusion". It's also done on occasion by Chameleon. The original Mysterio committed suicide in Daredevil, and in his subsequent appearances may or may not have Came Back Wrong, with actual illusion-casting powers.

Taken Up to Eleven in the Old Man Logan storyline. In it, Mysterio makes illusions so real that it tricks Wolverine into killing all of the other X-Men and breaking him when he dismisses the illusion.

The Clone Saga included a mysterious villain named Judas Traveller who appeared to have almost unlimited reality warping powers. After many issues of build-up, it came as something of a disappointment when it finally turned out he was just an illusionist.

A minor foe, Mirage, and Fusion, who appeared in only two stories. (Admittedly one of them was awesome.)

Jason "Mastermind" Wyngarde. Two of his three daughters are even better at it, being able to reinforce their illusions via telepathy (the third has different powers, which include inducing hallucinations but decidedly do not qualify for this trope since the hallucinations are completely random).

The only heroic mutant character with this power is Danielle Moonstar, formerly of the New Mutants. By using her illusion power in conjunction with her basic telepathy, she can cast images based on someone's greatest fears or desires. Or both.

The Squadron Supreme has Moonglow, whose myriad abilities are all illusions. The team's Hot Witch Arcanna also uses illusions, but as an incidental part of her magic powers.

In the Pony POV Series, this is the power of the Element of Deceit. It's user can change their appearance, create illusionary surroundings, create copies of themselves, and change their voice. Dark World!Applejack actually gets better at it after her HeelFace Turn, eventually gaining the ability to fool the sense of touch.

In Season 2, Pearls, Princess Gaia/Nightmare Whisper (AKA: Fluttershy!) is this. She uses her powers for her plan to put everypony in their own personal paradise dream world, because she genuinely wanted to give them happiness. It is also revealed that her Princess Gaia form is a fake, hiding her true state as Nightmare Whisper.

Princess Ansai an alternate Trixie's alicorn self from one of the Dark world cycles, is the ultimate master of illusion.

Somnambula is this as well. Unlike Princess Gaia, she used it for far more sinster uses, like life draining people while in a dream to

Getting Back on Your Hooves has Rarity, as in canon, but also Trixie's grandmother, Helena Midsummer, due to her special talent for theater. In "Happy Mother's Day" we actually get to see her teaching Trixie some of it.

Fallen King has Pegasus, who uses an endless hallway to trap the heroes.

Trixie is commonly depicted in fanfics to be an illusion specialist - although canonically she is far more versatile.

The Lunaverse version of Trixie falls somewhat under this trope, despite being the Element Of Magic. This may have something to do with her cutie mark being about doing magic for others, and especially for other's entertainment. She's even better with stage magic (slight of hoof without any actual quintessence manipulation) than she is with "real magic". Incidentally, this really backfires when she runs into the Lunaverse version of Twilight, who cannot believe that the Element of Magic could be an illusionist.

In The Lorelei Chronicles, the titular character is a heroic example. Whether she's hanging with the Avengers or being the Doctor's companion, you can count on her to use her psychic abilities to "make you sense what [she wants] you to sense" (in "Mischief Loves Company", it's stated that she has powers almost exactly like Loki of Marvel Comics, with the personality to match (minus the evilness)). When she has to, she'll use her powers to help her friends, but she prefers to just play pranks with them. Justified, in that her parents in her universe often have messy fights, so that when she universe hops to escape, she tries to prevent fighting by causing as much laughter as possible. Subverted slightly in that she can only use her power when in other universes.

In Opening Dangerous Gates, an enemy Tengu takes it Up to Eleven because he can affect all five senses. He can easily incapacitate people by completely cutting them off from their senses. Only extremely powerful beings like Ulquiorra can shrug off and dispel the effects.

Master, Pokémon?: Tamano/Delia. Takes out Hunter J despite J's anti-illusion goggles by casting an illusion between J's eyes and the goggles. J's left flailing around at phantoms, then realising she's stuck on a submerged ship about to implode.

Ashes of the Past: Brock. Makes full use of Ninetails, Zorua and Stantler's illusion abilities, and at one point pulls off an Inception-style illusion within an illusion during the Rota tournament in a battle against Max. Lampshaded by several characters, who joke that his Rock Type specialty in itself is misleading.

In Ice And Fire, Kallen got a Geass from C.C. that lets her create illusions.

In Masks Within Masks all Zoroak and Zorua can past powerful illusions, but Seven's illusion-casting skills are especially potent.

Film

Hook from Push can make any object look like another. He uses this as a Mundane Utility quite often, passing off relatively small amounts of money as large bills, and impressing people with his variation of card tricks. Used extensively in the climax. His illusions aren't permanent though, and the object will shift back to its original form after enough time has passed. Unfortunately, when Division found out he was doing this, his wife inexplicably turned up dead the next day after being involved in a car accident...despite the fact that she doesn't drive.

Scanner Cop II: During the final battle Staziak repeatedly creates a diversion by making Volkin attack an illusory projection of himself, causing Volkin to waste energy trying to kill Staziak.

The Japanese sorcerer Nakano in Highlander III: The Sorcerer, Connor MacLeod's mentor, possesses the power of illusion, using it to confuse his opponents. Kane steals it from him by killing him, using it to impersonate people and create fake projections to trick them.

Jason Strykers power, most of which is expressed in crafting landscapes and scenarios for his victims to wander, though at one point he also creates an illusion of Xavier being able to walk again. Impressively, during the climax of X2: X-Men United, he's able to keep two different illusory scenarios running at the same time. Jason is basically the X-Men movies continuity's version of Mastermind, mentioned above.

The B-movie Dark Haul features a version of The Jersey Devil that can project illusions into its victims' minds. One of its pursuers, taking a breather from hunting it, pops the top off a can of soda in the truck full of weapons he and his associates brought to kill the creature ... only to discover (too late) that he's trying to drink from an armed grenade.

In Pretty Cool, Howard uses his mind control powers to make Mitch see sexy illusions of their teacher. And in the sequel, the Genie uses her powers on Howard to make him see various sexy girls.

Literature

Sorceress Iris of the Xanth books had this as her Talent, and is capable of projecting illusions over long distances.

In Royal Chaos, the sequel to comedic fantasy Jason Cosmo, the wedding of a main character turns tragic due to what he immediately recognizes as the intervention of one of these. This leads to going on a quest to discover just which Master of Illusion was responsible (there turn out to be several candidates with equally strong motives) and kill him/her/it (one's a shapeshifter as well), despite that they're clearly just being toyed with whenever the Master bothers to check in to see how they're doing. Pretty much all the uses of illusion mentioned above come into play at some point against the heroes.

Peter Riviera in Neuromancer has the ability (enhanced by circuitry replacing a lung) to project the holographic products of his twisted psyche as art, distraction, weapons of terror, and even offensive lasers.

Jacob Maskelyne, the Wizard, of the Seekers of Truth. When he's really bringing his A game, no one near him can detect anything that he doesn't want them to.

Mars is Heaven, the classic sci-fi short by Ray Bradbury. An expedition to Mars is surprised to find an Earth village populated by all their deceased relatives, only to realize too late it's a trap designed to lure them outside their rocketship so they can be easily murdered.

In Edgar Rice Burroughs's Thuvia, Maid of Mars, Carthoris and Thuvia witness a battle between auburn-haired, white skinned men, green men, and banths. But when it ends, they see only the bodies of the last two. Shortly thereafter, they learn that the city uses such illusions to protect itself—and are accused of being illusions themselves.

"They lay in piles," she murmured. "There were thousands of them but a minute ago."

In Everworld, the witch Senna Wales started casting psychic illusions at age eight, and only got better at them as she grew older. Even after her power-up upon entering Everworld itself allowed her to use several new types of magic, illusion remained her strongest suit. She is able to make herself appear to be anyone or anything she can picture in her mind, turn invisible, and exclusively exclude certain targets from her trickery, allowing certain people to see her while she is invisible to others. She is also apparently able to spot others using illusion, as another witch tried and failed to fool her with the same tactic in the ninth book.

In A Planet Called Treason, there's a tribe that specializes in this. The only way they can be detected is by moving in a faster relative timeframe (the trait of another tribe). It leads to some squicky revelations in regards to a prior encounter when the protagonists realizes that it wasn't a woman that seduced him.

Lasciel from is one of these, but mainly just to Harry. When she first came out to play, she had Harry believing she was a bookstore employee, and even decked out an entire run-down tenement to look like comfortable housing to forward the illusion. This made Harry look somewhat delusional to everyone else as he talked to the woman that wasn't there. When Harry calls her on it, she shows how nasty she can get by triggering a curtain of fire, forcing Harry to go running for the fire escape... which doesn't exist, and would've resulted in him falling to his death if he hadn't hesitated.

Harry's apprentice, Molly, is also very skilled at illusion. While she's not good at physical magic, veils are second nature of her, and in time, she learns to use the combat applicability of bringing the sound and lights of a rave straight to a battlefield. In Ghost Story, Molly has found numerous ways to use small illusions to get people to fight each other, such as making a dirty cop think that the man bribing him is reaching for a gun.

Rokur Gepta, the last Sorcerer of Tund, in the The Lando Calrissian Adventures. For example, he has a You Have Failed Me moment quite a bit like Darth Vader's in Episode V, except that instead of choking his minion to death, he tortures him with images of his worst nightmare. (He later subjects Calrissian to a similar treatment.) It's eventually revealed that he's a Croke, a species of Always Chaotic Evil arachnids who specialize in this sort of powers. The fact that he inherited all the secrets of a powerful force sect made a bad situation far, far, worse. Turns out one reason the big scary Big Bad Gepta is so hard to battle one-on-one is because in addition to everything else, [[spoiler:he isn't there. The real Rokur Gepta is about the size of a mouse and projecting an image of a humanoid foe; no amount of blaster fire can harm an enemy that's several feet below where you're shooting.

Multiple Force-users are adept at this power. For example, Exar Kun uses a similar trick as the one described above to torture Corran Horn with his own fears. Corran himself, like his ancestors, is also proficient with illusions, which almost makes up for them not having telekinesis. And how does Corran use it? Sometimes in battle, and sometimes so Tionne can see how shed look with different hair.

Averted by Basilard. Despite being a top-tier mage and knowing several illusion spells his skill with them is poor because they're not his speciality. This is why he usually forgoes them in favor of straight up combat.

Dengel, Eric's other mentor, advises Eric to become one of these because he doesn't have the sheer power to overcome his enemies.

Lissa exhibits such powers in certain moments. Her first notable feat is making Jesse Zeklos have the illusion of spiders crawling all over him.

Lissa along with other spirit users; Adrian and Sonya Karp use illusions to mask the appearances of themselves and their allies. Used in the prison escapes of Victor Dashkov and Rose (on separate occasions), and to infiltrate guardian-protected locations. All for good causes though, they are not villains.

In Forging Divinity, Jonan is a proficient illusionist, using the Dominion of Sight to create images or make himself invisible. Using this comes at the cost of his own eyesight.

In The Witchlands, Glamourwitches can create illusions, both to alter their own appearance and that of their surroundings.

The Stormlight Archive: Lightweavers and Truthwatchers have access to the Surge of Illumination, which allows them to create illusions; Lightweavers mostly use it for disguise, while the Truthwatchers use it to create holograms to show others what they see. Despite the name, the Surge of Illumination covers all the senses, though novices have trouble with anything beyond sight.

Ray Bradbury's "Mars Is Heaven!": An expedition to Mars is surprised to find an Earth village populated by all their deceased relatives, only to realize too late it's a trap designed to lure them outside their rocketship so they can be easily murdered.

Live-Action TV

In an episode of Painkiller Jane the team hunts an enemy that uses illusions to kill people on the Witness Protection Program that were murderers, and is caught by the protagonists with his power apparently neutralized. When they go to check up on him at the internment center, he was "transferred to another facility"... but there was no other facility.

Farscape has two examples. First, Delvian Pa'us of a high enough level can alter one's perception of reality to the point of completely rewriting their memories. In the episode Rhapsody in Blue, while visiting a Delvian colony, the Pa'u's used this power of illusion to prevent the crew from leaving before their business concluded; one Delvian even convinced Crichton that she was his fiancee who had traveled with him on the Farscape project. A more classically villainous example is Maldis, a recurring character with some very impressive magical powers, among them being the ability to project visions and illusions. Given that he was also an Emotion Eater, he used this particular power to provoke fear and rage from his victims, which he would then feed on.

The oldest Star Trek example must be the original pilot, "The Cage", footage of which was reused in the only Original Series two-parter, "The Menagerie". The Talosians, alien inhabitants of planet Talos 4, are Sufficiently Advanced Aliens with psychic powers who use them to cause the illusion so realistic that their victims will believe anything - that they found a camp of crash survivors from many years before, that they are beautiful when they are in fact disfigured, or re-create whole landscapes out of memories of the victim (how the victim moves around such a landscape while in fact he's in a small cage, is left unanswered, but probably the movement is part of the illusion). A Talosian not only manages to convince his victims there's no hole in the wall (that they just made with a phaser), but also threatens the example from page text: to manipulate Enterprise crew into pressing wrong buttons and driving their ship into a crash.

In the Next Generation episode "Devil's Due" a con artist used holograms, transporters, and tractor beams to try and fool a planet into believing she was their version of the devil, here to collect on a thousand-year-old deal.

In the episode "Persistence of Vision" an alien tries to capture Voyager by drawing illusions from their subconscious fantasies (a Negative Space Wedgie does the same thing in "Bliss." The short version is, it's not a Negative Space Wedgie, it's a giant creature's jaws.). Eventually Janeway captures the alien and threatens to lock him up for the duration of their journey, whereupon he replies "I'd really like to accommodate you, but you see... I'm not really here!" whereupon he vanishes. In "Coda" an alien takes the form of Janeway's father and tries to convince her that she's been killed. The afterlife he's trying to entice her into is actually his realm where "you will nourish me for a long time." It sure looks like hell. And there's the sinister clown in "The Thaw", the creation of the fears of a group of aliens in suspended animation. Unfortunately he completely dominates their world and can kill them through stress-inducing illusions (like being decapitated by a guillotine) if they attempt to leave.

In "Remember", "Memorial", and "Living Witness" in that the person creating the illusions isn't a villain; they're just trying to inform people about a shameful incident in their own history.

The Trickster, especially in his first appearance. Also creates his own illusion of Supernatural's TV shows and traps Sam and Dean inside. This illusion was SO good that The Trickster claimed it was real, which was not a lie, given that he is an Archangel with Reality Warper powers.

Also War in Season 5, who manages to dump a whole town into armed conflict using no more than illusionary black demon eyes on people.

Company agent Candice Willmer, using her power of illusion to impersonate Simone Deveaux (to keep the NYPD from arresting precog Isaac Mendez), Sandra Bennet (as part of a sting to catch HRG betraying the Company), Niki Sanders (to kidnap technopathic kid genius Micah Sanders), and Niki's Superpowered Evil Side Jessica (to keep Niki from taking Micah back). To keep Micah from escaping, she cast an illusion that made every door and hallway lead back to the room he just left. She also created a simulation of a Maui beach inside a rundown shack in the middle of a Central American jungle and tried to seduce Sylar into working for the Company by offering to make all his fantasies come true (assuming said fantasies included a geisha; blonde, athletic twin women, and even himself).

Later in Volume Two, we are introduced to Matt Parkman's evil father Maury, who has learned how to use his Telepathy to project illusions into people's minds.

Matt Parkman himself! Not only can he create illusions, he can also force them into thinking what he wants is exactly what they want with Mind Control.

Chuck Norris dealt with one such Indian shaman in an episode of Walker, Texas Ranger. The bad guy multiplied himself to confound Walker, but he realised only one of the images is breaking a sweat. It seems to be a relatively common way to defeat illusionist villains.

A number of Ultra Series monsters, but a few had this as their defining trait.

Paragon from Return of Ultraman is arguably the greatest illusionist in the Ultra Series. This bizarre kaiju was used by the alien Stora to wreak havoc around Mt. Fuji with all sorts of mirages, including fooling MAT into attacking civilians and each other, causing cars to crash into each other down the highway, and even making itself seem bigger than it already is.

Galberos, a Cerberus-like kaiju from Ultraman Nexus, performs illusions by hypnotizing targets to create immortal illusions of their greatest fears, make itself seem as if it has turned invisible, and make doubles of itself, among other things.

A heroic example shows up in the 11th season of The X-Files with Jackson Van De Kamp. He was conceived and born as part of an experiment, and therefore has portions of extraterrestrial DNA in him. His most used force is this, and he especially enjoys creating the illusion of a horror character called [[

Ghouli]].

Taken: The aliens have the ability to read a person's mind and create images from their thoughts, memories and imagination:

In "Beyond the Sky", the scientists studying the bodies found at the Roswell crashsite determine that they are capable of perfect mimicry on a cellular level as their cells display whatever properties the scientists think that they might have at any given moment. They receive a more extensive demonstration of this power when one of the seemingly dead aliens turns out to be alive and convinces that Dr. Goldin is a 13-year-old boy undergoing his Bar Mitzvah.

In "Jacob and Jesse", the aliens create an image of the title character of the children's book The Adventures of Artemis P. Fonswick to lure the seven-year-old Jesse onto one of their ships. Five years later in 1958, he sees the same image just before they abduct him once again.

In both "High Hopes" and "Maintenance", immediately before he is abducted, Jesse sees an image of the creepy carny that frightened him during a trip to the carnival when he was eight years old. In "Charlie and Lisa", both Jesse's son Charlie and Lisa see the same image as a prelude to abduction.

In "Maintenance", the aliens create an image of Jesse from Charlie's memories in order to lure him to Morgan's Junction, Missouri so they can abduct him.

In "God's Equation", Allie demonstrates that she possesses the same ability but she uses it for a kinder purpose than abduction. She creates an image of Dale Watson's late son Luke, who was killed in The Gulf War, to let him know that Luke forgave him for the big argument that they had before he shipped out.

In "John", Allie disguises herself as General Beers so that she, Charlie and Lisa can escape from the military.

Tabletop Games

Vampire: The Masquerade has the Ravnos clan and their specific Discipline, Chimerstry. Its general levels range from affecting one sense alone to creating illusions so tangible they do damage. When you get into the elder levels, reality gets... strange.

Geist: The Sin-Eaters has the Phantasmal Key, which deals with the hallucinatory and ephemeral aspects of death and the afterlife. When filtered through the various Manifestations, its powers include cloaking oneself in guises so horrific they rend sanity (Caul), causing someone to experience terrible visions (Curse), hitting someone with an illusion so powerful it causes damage (Rage), and causing yourself to look like anyone else (Shroud).

This is a standard ability of blue magic. The typical mechanical representation is that the illusory creature you summon is cheaper than usual, but opponents can Shatter The Illusion—if the creature is targeted by some effect, the illusion breaks and the creature dies.

This common weakness is negated by "Lord of the Unreal," a wizard that beefs up illusions and makes them impossible to target.

Jace Beleren is a prominent user of illusion magic in the storyline and in the Video Game Adaptation Duels of the Planeswalkers. However, this has not appeared on any of his four planeswalker cards so far, a fact that Head Designer Mark Rosewater has publicly regretted.

Also, Ixidor's title is "Reality sculptor". He's such a good illusionist, he can will his illusions into reality!

Masters of psychokinesis can use Mass Push to do this to up to 10 people at once.

Dungeons & Dragons has plenty of illusion spells, and Halfling Bards tend to be illusionists. For several editions, the Wizard/Mage class had specialist variations, who specialized in one specific school of magic. Illusionist was one of them, and back in 2E Gnome mages had to be illusionists. And before there were specialist wizards, illusionist was its own class. In all cases, a high-level illusionist was a master of illusion by default.

Illusion spells in Kitsune: Of Foxes and Fools are powerful Trick cards that double a fox's wits when scheming against a specific type of fool. Like False Riches works best on greedy fools. Of course, other kitsune are immune to illusions.

In Shadowrun, movie studios like to hire mages to handle special effects since it's considerably cheaper than CGI or practical effects when you have a guy who can craft believable illusions on command.

Toys

Several characters in BIONICLE, though they notably all appear to have the same weakness: the illusion vanishes the instant the person it's being cast stops believing in it.

Kingdom Hearts: The page quote comes from Zexion, one of the members of Organization XIII. Illusions are pretty much the only things he uses with the heroes, and he doesn't even fight Riku in the original Chain of Memories. But that doesn't make him a pushover. Final Mix + and Re: Chain of Memories show just how far the Cloaked Schemer can implement his powers: cloning himself and his weapons, copying attacks, blocking/stealing combat abilities, pocket dimensions where he traps his foes give the guy an inch, and he'll obliterate you.

Reisen Udongein Inaba has the ability to refract and twist light and other waves, both disorienting and confusing her enemies with illusions and inducing insanity.

Nue Houjuu has a variation on this power: she can disguise the true shape of things. Including herself, so no one has ever seen her true form, and she has appeared different to everyone who's ever seen her.

Stanislaus Braun ensnares the main character in his virtual world as part of the story of Fallout 3.

The Mesmer class of Guild Wars boils this trope down into a spellcaster profession, with illusion (in addition to domination and inspiration) magic as one of their primary attributes. This applies even more to the Mesmer in Guild Wars 2, where they are able to conjure up a small army of illusory doubles of themselves and can are also capable of rendering themselves and their allies invisible.

In City of Heroes, Illusion Control is a powerset for heroic Controllers.

The Spy in Team Fortress 2 can disguise as one of the enemy's team in order to backstab them, or as a different class of his own team in order to cause confusion and misleading.

Hargon from Dragon Quest II. A good deal of the game is spent just trying to find a way to break through his illusions.

Pokémon Black and White introduces Zoroark and its pre-evolution Zorua, who come with the ability Illusion. In the games, the disguise is dependent on the Pokémon positioned last in the player's party. However, the illusion is broken whenever the user takes direct damage from another Pokémon's offensive move.

Laughing Octopus in Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is arguably this. She's able to hide herself as nearly anything or anyone within the small medical clinic you fight her in, sometimes turning invisible, pretending to be your Robot Buddy, cloaking herself with inky mist, sometimes even just playing dead as one of her subordinate soldiers. While all this is going on, an extremely disturbing soundtrack laced with dissonant laughter plays. Laughing Octopus also effectively has access to the powers of Doctor Octopus, too, due to the four large mechanical tentacles attached to her.

Emperor Ladantine of Lusternia was a Master of Illusion and a Dream Weaver, making him an adept spy and very dangerous after his FaceHeel Turn. He managed to hide the fact he had become a lich through illusion - though he slipped up at least once, when it was noticed he was not affected by the extreme heat of the Plane of Vortex, cluing the good guys in as to his real nature.

Anyone holding one of the Pieces of Eden becomes one of these in the Assassin's Creed franchise. This is used as an explanation for many seemingly impossible or unlikely events in history, including Jesus's miracles. You can even do some of it in the games, such as Altaïr using an Apple of Eden to defeat an entire army by causing them to think an army of assassins is striking them down.

Illusions in Defense of the Ancients: All-Stars are simply copies of units that deal proportionally less damage than its original, take much more damage, and can't use active skills. While sometimes they can come in handy for tricking the enemy into thinking it's you, they are more often used by carries to multiply their damage output. Chaos Knight, Terrorblade, and Naga Siren are carries that use illusions of themselves to deal damage and have skills that synergize with illusions well, and any hero can have two copies of themselves by using a Manta Style or picking up a Rune of Illusion. But the true king of illusions is Phantom Lancer. Not only do all but one skill create illusions of himself, his illusions can create illusions. With as much as 14 Phantom Lancers on the map, things can get hectic when you're facing an army of him.

Properly decked out, Phantom Lancer players will be surprised that they killed someone without knowing simply because they left a stray illusion on the map

Circe from Heroes of Newerth specializes in illusions and plays this trope straight by craftily utilizing them to trick her enemies. She has the ability to create an illusion of any hero, which means not only can you create several illusions of your team's carry to multiply its damage output, you can recreate your own team and maybe trick the enemy team into wasting their skills on them. Another skill discretely turns herself invisible and leave a copy of her illusion to distract her foes while she makes an escape. Silhouette also deserves a mention, as her ultimate creates an almost perfect illusion of herself. While normally illusions are proportionally weaker than its original, her illusion is unusually powerful and at max level, it actually takes and deals normal damage. She can also swap positions with her illusion, which is great for avoiding damage should the enemy team try and kill her.

Downplayed, but still deserving of mention, is Leblanc ("The Deceiver") from League of Legends. Her ultimate ability lets her either create a physical copy of herself at her own location that uses an attack, then runs in the opposite direction from the real Leblanc and vanishes after a few seconds, or create an illusory copy anywhere on the map that runs toward the nearest enemy, uses a fake attack, and then vanishes. Both copies are indistinguishable from the real Leblanc and can be used to trick enemies into wasting their abilities, chasing the wrong one, or running away from a fight thinking they are about to be outnumbered. She can also fake out enemies by blinking to a position she was a few seconds ago. Her illusion abilities are more extensive in her lore, where she influences a major political event by impersonating a king.

Similarly, Shaco is based around tricking enemies with cloaking and a controllable copy of himself.

In Skyrim the perk 'Master of the Mind' allows you to use illusion spells against undead, daedra and automatons. However, many Illusion spells from the previous game are missing or placed in different schools.note This leaves only Fury (attack others), Calm (stop violence), Fear (Run away), Invisibility, Courage (stop running away), Muffle (move silently) and Clairvoyance (path to next goal) as Illusion spells. Command Daedra now exists in the Conjuration school. Light and Paralyze are now Alteration spells.

In Batman: Arkham Asylum, the Scarecrow uses hallucinogenic gas on Batman to play with his mind. Since this is a video game, this causes Batman to enter a Mental World populated by skeleton enemies where Scarecrow is fifty feet tall. If you lose in combat during these levels, Batman goes insane. (And when you defeat the giant Scarecrow in the final one, Batman breaks through the illusion and beats Scarecrow senseless).

Ying from Paladins conjures illusions of herself that heal allies and explode on command. She can also trade places with any illusion on a whim to avoid attacks.

Visual Novels

Illusion is one of Razi's specialties in Havenfall Is for Lovers. Since he's one of the good guys, he largely uses it to help maintain the Masquerade (for instance, to prevent people from noticing the supernatural brawl going on in the middle of the day early in his first season), or to confuse enemies during a fight (such as making a mook's weapon "disappear"). He's capable of much more complicated illusions, however - at the extreme end, he shows himself able to trap someone in a Lotus-Eater Machine which is very difficult to break out of even once the person stuck in it realizes it's an illusion.

Web Animation

RWBY has two examples. Neo introduced in volume 2 can create something akin to mirages/holograms that have some physical properties(they shatter like glass upon contact). Emerald, we learn in volume 3, can create hallucinations that only affect whomever she is focusing on. She can't target more than one person without being strained.

Web Comics

Mort from Gunnerkrigg Court just uses his powers to scare people (and he isn't even very good at it). Martin seemed to have similar powers, though he was using them unconsciously—and fooling himself as well.

The party's Spoony Bard, Elan, mostly casts illusion spells. In the early comics he could only think of using them to cast female versions of enemies to distract them, which even he eventually noticed never worked. But later he learned how to disguise himself, lead enemies away with decoys, and fake summoning spells.

Roy's father was an Illusionist, and even as a ghost he can pose as a big, scary Celestial with a giant flaming sword.

Fata Morgana in Flipside, so well that she can trick spells with her illusions.

Vish, an angel of the Trickster Goddess, at the end of Book 4, in order to prevent Kawunei from killing his escaped slave to protect his reputation. He promises to teach the art to Anthem after revealing the truth.

The dubious sorcerer-adventurer Vax regularly employs illusions as a way of evening the odds in melees, using charms and talismans as the magical equivalent of Snakes-In-A-Can [1].

In El Goonish Shive, the Demonic Duck (being a professional distraction) is also a self-proclaimed master of illusion.

Justin: That couldn't have been an illusion! She tickled me!Duck: What part of "master" are you failing to understand?

Suiting to his nature as a Manipulative Bastard, Yang Jeonghak from Gosu is able to cast remarkably realistic and horrifying illusions upon even powerful opponents. This is most notable when he made Gha Woobok believe his arm had been torn off.

Song Yerin is also a surprisingly (or not) powerful illusionist, casting her illusions in a manner very reminiscent of the Sharingan.

In Skin Horse, GODOT can remotely hack people's language processing centers, making imaginary writing appear on blank walls or, terrifying, in place of real writing. He causes a number of disasters by causing people to read signs or instructions wrong.

Marie: A wonderfully hallucinogenic gas. It makes the subject very suggestible. We simply spread it around and shouted "The Heterodynes are here!" It was easy. Yeti: They see what we tell them they see. Marie: I'm rather proud of it.

Erfworld: Jack Snipe, as are all Foolamancers, though Jack is noted to be particularly good even by his caster class's standards. His abilities go far beyond simple tricks of the light- Jack can cloak entire armies and cities at a time, project illusions of every sense except touch (yes, that includes taste), and at one point enables a blinded Jillian to "see" by broadcasting an illusion of his own perception into her head. He's almost-singlehandedly the reason why Faq managed to remain an unknown kingdom for as long as it did.

Web Original

In the Red Panda Adventures episode 51, "The Puzzle Master", this is how the villain ensnares his victims in a seemingly endless maze.

In the Global Guardians PBEM Universe, multiple characters are Masters of Illusion. Peekaboo, a member of the Vandolls supervillain team, creates light-based images. Mindscape projects images into the minds of her opponents, as does the Indian supervillain Rakshasa. Amethyst is a sorceress who specializes in illusion magic. Dream Catcher manipulates people's dreams and can bring them into reality as illusions. Figment, a student at the Hyperion Academy, creates holograms.

Confundus of the Whateley Universe loves to do the illusion bit, but has other powers she can call on (but only one at a time: she's a Package Deal Psychic). Then there are Beltane and Thorn, who are both masters of illusion because they're tricksters: they both manipulate ectoplasm.

Nyx from the web serial Worm can create ultra-realistic illusions that are somehow made of poison gas.

Mikelle, the main character of Polyhistor Academy, specializes in Illusions. The creator once compared what he can do to Itachi.

Gaia, the good spirit can do this as well. Her spirit appearance can be summoned by Ma-Ti's Heart Ring, or she can appear to tell Planeteers they had an eco-crisis cooking up.

The Heart ring has an element of telepathy. If not for the fact that it's not that kind of show, there's no reason Ma-Ti couldn't make the villains think a cliff was flat ground and make the enemy a rather icky mess a thousand feet below.

Mad Mod in the Teen Titans animated series is a tech-based master of illusion, controlling holographic emitters by use of his cane.

Another good Master of Illusion: On Jem, Synergy's output are life-like holograms.

The teenage Guardian, Scooter, from The Gobots, uses his holograms to help the Guardians trick the Renegades.

The West African hero Anansi the Spider has the power of storytelling, granted to him by the sky god Nyame; this tends to manifest itself as the ability to project illusions. He can also walk on walls for some reason too, although that could just be another illusion!

Another, slightly more villainous example: Mirage, Boom's kid sister, also has the power to create illusions. Unlike Anansi, she received her powers from the Big Bang that gave all of the other show's metahumans their superpowers. Slightly villainous because her heart's not in it at all, and there's something Woobieish about the way she always holds her arms across her chest as if she were cold.

The Psycho Pirate, as portrayed in Batman: The Brave and the Bold. He traps Batman and the Outsiders in a Your Mind Makes It Real simulation so he can feed off their negative emotions. What takes it to Master of Illusion level is when Batman exits the simulator and sees Psy Pi off-handedly kill the Outsiders, and flips out. Turns out Bats is still inside the sim, and the apparent deaths were an illusion to trick him into powering Psy Pi with his rage.

"Master of magic, spells and illusion, Enemies crumble in fear and confusion! Mandrake!"

She hasn't used it much, but Rarity from My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic has this is one of her magical abilities, as shown in "Suited For Success" when she used it to provide special effects for her second fashion show. Pretty much everypony's entrance involved completely changing the stage into some fantastic location, all done by Rarity's magic. Zecora also uses illusions to spice up her telling of the story of Nightmare Night.

Darcy from Winx Club uses this as well as her psychic powers to manipulate people for her own purposes. Mirta also uses illusions, though Darcy can see right through them.

The Impostors from The Secret Show use holograms to shapeshift into anything and anyone they want.

The fairy Puck in Gargoyles, borrowed from the character in A Midsummer Night's Dream, can work incredibly detailed illusions ... as well as genuine transformations (and of course, he'll never say which is which).

Happens in The Avengers Captain America is placed under an illusion and believes he is reliving his past. He even gets to save Bucky. Ironically it's the illusion of Bucky that solemnly convinces the Captain to wake up and tells him that he knows this isn't how it actually happened. Captain America Thanks Bucky for saving him again before taking his advice.

Real Life

There's a reason magicians are sometimes called "illusionists".

Pretty much any animal that employs camouflage or mimicry to protect themselves from predators (or drive them away, in some cases) qualifies, but the reigning champion of natural world masters of illusion are the cephalopods (octopi, squids, cuttlefish, etc.). Not only can they change color to match they're surroundings, but their skin texture as well. The mimic octopus, in particular, is a good example.

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